Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. This week’s Mantra is: As we enter our 3rd school year in the presence of a global pandemic our “new normal” has been established. How are you using tech differently compared to 2019? I purposefully selected this quotation to not only encourage reflection on the role that technology plays in your classroom but also because it aligns with the wording of a fantastic Manitoba PD that is taking place this week! The New Normal School is a half-day virtual event on… Read More
Happy May!
This school year has seemed to fly by. It seems like every few weeks there have been new guidelines or projects to explore and all staff are consistently reinventing their practices to adapt. An excellent example of this came literally 30mins after I filmed and sent out this video: new health guidelines mean that I will not be in schools as much as in-person visits are limited to help reduce spread of VOCs in our communities. We just keep rolling with the punches and trying our best! With the start of a new months comes a new monthly ICT newsletter.… Read More
Maintaining Tech Routines
As we start a new week Manitobans are in the midst of the third-wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. At the time of writing we have seen schools in multiple communities move to remote learning due to outbreaks and the inability to provide staffing due to isolation requirements. While MVSD has been fortunate to have experienced low levels of cases (13 total cases during the 20/21 school year so far) we are cognizant of the fact that this can change at any time. With the vast majority of our students attending face-to-face classes everyday, some of our familiarity with our digital… Read More
What Have Your Students Taught You?
Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. I recently found a series on Tik Tok entitled, “Tech Tips I Learned From An 8-Year Old”, where teachers share the game-changing tech tips their students have taught them. The tips range from keyboarding shortcuts and program features to tech tool suggestions and digital “life hacks”. The series is very light and fun and has resulted in the curation of a variety of tech tools that are assisting teachers while also creating a collaborative learning environment that honours the student expertise… Read More
Mantra Monday
Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. This week’s Mantra is: As I work with educators I am finding that it can be easy to get hyper-fixated on a particular tool (Teams, Seesaw, Forms, etc). This focus can create a tunnel-vision where educators are only seeing the features of that particular tool and end up designing their lessons around that tool rather than focusing on pedagogy and how particular tools can help address their learning goals. Even though our teaching environment may shift from the classroom to student… Read More
Mantra Monday
Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. January is recognized as Clean Up Your Computer Month and, with so much more of our practice being digital during remote learning, this is especially important! As such, the month’s posts will be focused on this theme. To kick off the month, this week’s Mantra is: Within our classrooms we usually have a pretty set routine when it comes to organizing and maintaining the physical items we accumulate: final assessments (exams), physical mail, administrative memos, secretarial notes, anecdotal records, sub records,… Read More
Mantra Monday
Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. This week’s Mantra is: As you may know, I am a huge advocate for equity in education. Unforunately, the Covid-19 pandemic has stripped our learners from the environment which strived to offer a level playing field for all: our school buildings. In the ed tech world, these buildings were our source for connectivity and digital devices. With our learners now being at home (whether that is full-time, part-time, etc) we have lost that level playing field and, if educators are relying… Read More
Mantra Monday
Every Monday I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider. This week’s Mantra is: I’ve always been a big believer of doing a few things well as opposed to taking on too many things and not being able to fully commit. There is a huge pressure in the tech industry, with ed tech being no exception, that there is always something, “bigger/better/newer”. While this can be exciting, jumping to something new all the time in education can lead to frustration for both teachers and students (this also extends to families). Before… Read More